


three's a party (a slumber party)

by Anonymous



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Fluff, M/M, Multi, OT3, Polyamory
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-27
Updated: 2019-05-27
Packaged: 2020-03-20 01:23:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18982324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Days like this were few and far in between, to John's immense regret. Some days, he likes to imagine a future where most days are like this. Days when the world is peaceful, and they can rest. Follow their routines.





	three's a party (a slumber party)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [satanicnightjar](https://archiveofourown.org/users/satanicnightjar/gifts).



John doesn't know why the subway never floods. To be honest, he finds he doesn't care. Or at least, he's content to let the drainage system of their secret underground hideout be the problem of some other member of the team. He makes sure the bad guys point guns at him and not anyone else. Let someone else can take care of the plumbing. John thinks that's an equitable division of labor.

...it's definitely the Machine though. Harold was great at many things, and serviceable in many others, but John was fairly sure that a plumber was not one of them.

Days like this were few and far in between, to John's immense regret. Some days, he likes to imagine a future where _most_ days are like this. Days when the world is peaceful, and they can rest. Follow their routines.

John cleans his guns, makes sure they're ready to keep everything John cares about as safe as they can. Harold checks essays about topics that might as well have been written in code, for the amount that John could understand them. Bear worries a ragged tennis ball between his teeth, having tired himself out by getting Harold to throw it and chasing it down. The weight of the world remains upon their shoulders, but it recedes somehow. Hangs in the background, out of sight and almost out of mind. Their only concern right now is which takeout places remain open at this time. A leisurely dinner, together as themselves and not apart as their covers, is a rare and delightful treat.

Outside, John is vaguely aware that it's raining, but it doesn't touch them in here.

 

* * *

 

John hears Root coming before he sees her. Of course, Bear's wagging tail is a dead giveaway, but still. It counts. John speaks as soon as she comes into view.

"You look like something the cat drowned trying to drag in," John states the obvious.

"Hello to you too, big lug," Root doesn't even look at him, already unzipping a jacket that was very clearly not made for this weather.

Predictably, Harold says nothing, too preoccupied with correcting the grammar on his students' papers to notice that Root has come back. It's a good sign, in John's opinion, that Harold thinks the subway is safe enough to let his guard down. Safe enough to let himself become so absorbed in a task that he forgets to be paranoid, if only for a little while.

John finishes assembling the gun he'd been cleaning while Root is preoccupied with Bear. When the AK-47 is as it should be, John puts it away, grabbing a towel and a shirt on his way to Root.

Root had started to get close when Shaw was... without Shaw. John didn't know what relationship they'd had, exactly. But that when she initiated a kiss, he hadn't had the heart to push her away. That he was so busy trying to keep their heads above water while avoiding Samaritan that he didn't know how they'd come to this, but he wouldn't trade it for anything.

In another lifetime, John thinks that perhaps it would not be this simple. That in another universe, Root's remarks will bear teeth, sharp and cutting, that John's reply would be in kind, and that Harold would have known that Root was coming even before Bear did, bracing himself for the incoming encounter.

Instead, John has this. Gets to have this. Root smiling at him briefly as she sheds her clothes. John dries her, not with detachment, exactly, but the touch doesn't invite more It is what it is.

In another lifetime, she would have been coy about it, John thinks, making unnecessary movements so that it seemed more erotic than functional. Tonight, Root refrains. She balls up her wet clothes and exchanges them for the towel in John's hands. He goes to put them in their proper place while she finishes what he started.

 

* * *

 

When John comes back, it's to Root making free with Harold's lap. In that past, he'd allowed Root's proximity to Harold because it was necessary, because Harold tolerated it, because it wasn't his place to say otherwise.

Now, Harold has explicitly told him that he would ask Root to stop, if the proximity made John uncomfortable. But John has found that he doesn't mind. Now, the closeness fills John with a warmth. Like he was seeing something rare and precious. Not to mention, Harold should have whatever he wanted. All the nice things for Harold. and that John would have the nice things too, well, that was just a bonus.

John watches them from a distance, doesn't want to interrupt. Root says something that makes Harold laugh, gesturing at something on the paper Harold is currently correcting. John leaves the subway to get them all an extremely late dinner. He wants tonight to last forever, but will settle for lengthening it with good food and good company

 

* * *

 

Of course, what John has failed to take into account is the storm that brought them here in the subway at the same time. He forgot that the storm means that businesses will be closed. He tries Harold's favorite Indian place first, before heading for Root's Thai place. Both are closed, but his favorite diner is open.

It's getting easier to still count that as a win.

 

* * *

 

John returns. They eat. The moisture in the air and the yellow lighting lends the subway a softness that permeates the meal. Although not their favorites, Harold and Root seem to enjoy the food anyway, which makes John happier than it ought to, all things considered. The talk is carefully steered away from topics that might be too heavy, and one way or another, it leads to this.

It's far from the first kiss John and Root have shared. It's the first one that seems so _domestic_ , though. It's their first time kissing with Harold so _close_.

John is surprised to find that he likes it. Having an audience. They don't go very far, falling asleep soon after eating.

Outside, the rain continues, and the Machine keeps vigil.

**Author's Note:**

> I WAS SUPPOSED TO WRITE SOMETHING DARKER BUT THE FLUFF BUNNY HIT ME AND NOW I HAVE THIS


End file.
